A highly selective spectrophotometric determination of niobium (V) using 3-hydroxy-2-[1'-phenyl-3'-(p-chlorophenyl)-4'-pyrazolyl]-4-oxo-4H-1-benzopyran as a complexing agent.

3-Hydroxy-2-[1'-phenyl-3'-(p-chlorophenyl)-4'-pyrazolyl]-4-oxo-4H-1benzopyran (HPCPB) is used as an analytical reagent for the spectrophotometric determination of niobium in trace amounts with which it forms a yellow coloured complex (4:1) in perchloric acid medium. The complex is extractable into chloroform and shows absorption maximum at 407-418 nm with a molar absorptivity of 2.79 x 10(4) L mol(-1) cm(-1) and Sandell's sensitivity equal to 0.0033 microg Nb(V) cm(-2), respectively. Beer's law holds good in the range 0-1.2 microg Nb ml(-1), with a standard deviation of +/- 0.0015 absorbance units. The method is free from the interference of a large number of elements and handles satisfactorily the analysis of various samples of varying complexity.

Extractive spectrophotometric determination of tungsten(VI) using 3-hydroxy-2-(2'-thienyl)-4-oxo-4H-1-benzopyran.

A simple, rapid, highly sensitive and selective spectrophotometric method for the determination of tungsten(VI) in trace amounts is developed using 3-hydroxy-2-(2'-thienyl)-4-oxo-4H-1-benzopyran (HTB) as a reagent for the complexation of metal ion and extracting the 1:2 (metal:ligand) complex into dichloromethane from 0.2 M HCl solution. It obeys Beer's law in the range 0-2.8 microg Wml(-1) with molar absorptivity and Sandell's sensitivity at 415 nm as 6.45 x 10(4) L mol(-1) cm(-1) and 0.0029 microg W(VI) cm(-2), respectively. The method is free from the interference of a large number (39) of elements and handles satisfactorily the analysis of various samples of varying complexity.